Have you got bold goals for Black Friday? Then, you can’t expect to just send out a couple of emails with a generic 10% discount.
To stand out, compel your audience to choose your deals, and get the very most out of them, you must plan ahead and be strategic.
The best part? Once you set up the right Black Friday sales funnel, it’ll do the hard work for you, skyrocketing your revenue! Here’s how.
1. Set your Black Friday sales goals
You can’t smash your goals if you’re not clear on what they are. So, what exactly do you want to achieve with your Black Friday campaign? For example:
- Increasing your overall revenue
- Having a quick cash injection
- Clearing out your old inventory
- Reaching new customers
- Building your email list
- Re-engaging a dormant one
- Boosting customer retention
- Testing a brand-new product or service
Be specific, and set measurable goals and KPIs accordingly (such as your target sales volume, website traffic, conversion rate, average order value, or new email subscribers).
2. Get super clear on your target audience
Coming up with a generic Black Friday deal doesn’t cut it anymore.
Instead, start from your specific audience to then work your way backwards and plan the perfect Black Friday offer for them.
This will obviously depend on the main goal you just set, but for example, it could be:
- Existing customers (if you want to boost your revenue and loyalty)
- Cold leads (if your goal is to increase your customer base)
- Leads who’ve already engaged with your brand but haven’t purchased yet (for a shorter funnel)
and so on.
You can take this one step further by dividing your target audience into segments (for example, based on their past behaviours or preferences) and creating different Black Friday offers for each of them. More on that soon!
3. Create your Black Friday offers
By now, you have your main goal and are clear on your target audience. So, it’s time to bring it all together by creating an unmissable Black Friday offer for them!
- Come up with a valuable offer or bonus – Focus on something that would be attractive for your specific target audience, and package it into an appealing and scroll-stopping deal. For example, it could be a substantial discount, a bundle built around a theme, or an exclusive bonus (like free shipping or a complimentary 1:1 session)
- Add urgency – Create scarcity, and double down on FOMO to compel your audience to take action on Black Friday. For example, this could be because of your limited stock or a set number of 1:1 spots, or you could choose to only offer the juiciest 70% discount to the first 100 customers before it goes down to 60%
4. Build awareness and anticipation before Black Friday
On Black Friday, you reap what you sow weeks earlier. So, you must put everything in place (ideally, in October) and build momentum throughout November.
- Prepare a landing page – Include compelling copy teasing your Black Friday offer, a countdown timer to create anticipation, and reviews from past customers to get new ones excited. The call to action? Signing up for your Black Friday list (we’ll cover that in the next point)
- Create hype on social media – Keep teasing your upcoming Black Friday offer, creating engaging content around it, sharing sneak peeks, and harnessing relevant hashtags like #BlackFridayDeals. To reach more people faster, run some paid social media ads too, directing that traffic to your landing page
- Set up retargeting campaigns – Don’t forget about all the users and website visitors who’ve interacted with you before. After all, they’re already aware of and interested in your brand! So, it’ll be easier to re-engage them with the right ads, collecting their contact details through your landing page
5. Capture leads before Black Friday sales
Let’s say Black Friday is already here. Would you rather:
- Drop your offer out of the blue to your standard email list and on social media, hoping enough people see it… even though they’ll be bombarded with lots of similar ones?
- Send your offer directly to a list of people who’ve already expressed an interest in it?
The latter, right?
That’s exactly why, when building awareness and anticipation before Black Friday, your goal should be to turn those eyeballs into subscribers.
Consider a Black Friday offer waitlist
A Black Friday waitlist takes this to the next level by inspiring a premium sense of exclusivity.
Instead of a generic offer that’s available to everyone (like what most competitors are doing), you’ll ONLY release it to those on the waitlist. Alternatively, they could get a higher discount, priority access, or additional bonuses compared to everyone else.
So, how can you promote this Black Friday waitlist?
- On your landing page, lead with the benefits of joining it
- To compel more people to take action, consider offering them something valuable straightaway, like a free resource or buying guide. Even better? Use a ScoreApp quiz lead magnet that’s engaging for them and will help you collect data, segmenting your subscribers (for example, “What’s Your Fashion Aesthetic?” or “Discover Your Entrepreneur Profile”). This will then allow you to make your messaging and offers even more relevant for them!
- Keep nurturing the people on your waitlist (we’ll show you how in the next step)
6. Set up your Black Friday sales funnel for maximum conversion
For the best results, always meet your audience where they are right now with relevant and, wherever possible, personalised messages.
So, your strategy and focus should be different for each stage of your Black Friday sales funnel.
Top of the funnel – Awareness
- Engage and grow your audience – Target them with paid ads on social media and Google, and create compelling organic content (sneak peeks, videos, user-generated content, and so on) that teases your Black Friday offer, highlighting its value
- Build your list – Those ads and social media content will get you lots of views, but make sure you’re always directing them to your Black Friday landing page. With ScoreApp, that’s a breeze because you can lead with your attractive waitlist quiz!
Middle of the funnel – Consideration
- Use retargeting ads – If someone has visited your website or landing page without taking action, use ads to remind them of your upcoming offer, inviting them to sign up for exclusive perks
- Set up an email sequence – Your waitlist email sequence is the bridge between your initial teaser and Black Friday itself. So, use it to build and maintain momentum! Nurture your subscribers with waitlist-only content, previews, countdowns, and freebies, always reminding them of the exclusive perks they’ll get on Black Friday. When you start with a ScoreApp quiz, you can connect it to your email marketing platform and personalise these sequences for each segment based on their answers (much more effective!)
- Incorporate social proof – Build trust using customer ratings and reviews in your emails, and consider including user-generated content in some of your ads
Bottom of the funnel – Decision
- Create a seamless checkout process – Your Black Friday sales funnel and marketing will build up to this. So, once the big day comes, your e-commerce or website must be easy to navigate, mobile-friendly, and with a smooth checkout process. For example, you should remove friction (like unnecessary fields), offer several payment options, and test everything in advance to make sure there are no surprises
- Send reminder emails – So far, you’ve been nurturing your list and building anticipation. Now that Black Friday is here, it’s time to get them to take ACTION! So, personalise your emails (for example, based on each subscriber’s ScoreApp quiz results), use a countdown to highlight that urgency, and lead with the benefit of your exclusive Black Friday offer
- Set up cart abandonment emails – Around Black Friday, cart abandonment rates reach a whopping 77.74%. So, if you forget about these potential customers, you’re leaving A LOT of money on the table. Instead, within those first 24h, retarget them with ads and emails, reminding them of what they left behind. Still no purchase? Consider offering them a bigger discount or perk, like free shipping
7. Upsell and cross-sell to increase sales
To really maximise your sales this Black Friday, encourage your customers to buy other relevant or complementary products, too.
You can upsell and cross-sell:
- Before check-out, by recommending additional products once someone has already put one in their basket
- Afterwards, via email (for example, using their ScoreApp quiz data to recommend more products or services based on their situation, needs, and preferences)
8. Follow-up after Black Friday
Black Friday might be over, but your sales funnel doesn’t have to be! After your big sale, analyse your data, and follow up with new subscribers and customers.
- Stay in touch – Thank your new customers for their purchase. If you gained new email subscribers who didn’t buy from you, keep nurturing them and building trust. Your post-Black Friday emails can also include more personalised deals and incentives (like bundles for Cyber Monday or exclusive discount codes)
- Review your Black Friday sales funnel data – Find out what worked well and what can be improved. Then, use it to inform new campaigns. With ScoreApp, you get built-in analytics that are both in-depth and easy to understand
Sell more on Black Friday with a ScoreApp funnel
By planning and setting up a strategic Black Friday sales funnel, you’ll reach more people, optimise your promotions, and truly maximise your revenue.
With a ScoreApp sales funnel, you get to:
- Create a landing page for your Black Friday waitlist
- Attach a valuable free quiz to compel more people to join it while collecting plenty of data
- Segment your subscribers
- Connect your waitlist to your email marketing platform, setting up automated nurturing sequences
- Personalise your messaging and offers for each segment based on their behaviours or quiz results
- Set yourself up for success by launching your Black Friday offer to a list of people who’ve already been nurtured
So, leave those generic last-minute discounts to your competitors. Create your Black Friday sales funnel with ScoreApp today and for FREE.
